Been In Love Before: A Novel (7 page)

Chapter Eleven

“June?” Dr. Macgregor said through the intercom.

A few moments later, her voice came over the speaker, “Yes, sir?”

“I’m going to need a little bit longer with Mr. Long this morning than I originally anticipated.” He looked over and smiled at Jeff, who sat back on the sofa and seemed to relax, as he uncocked the gun and returned the hammer to its resting position. “So I want you to cancel all my morning appointments, please. All of them.”

“Cancel? Did you say cancel, Dr. Macgregor?”

“Yes. Cancel. Thank you, June. Oh, and reschedule Billy for tomorrow afternoon.”

“Uhhh . . . okay.”

“That’ll be all. Thanks, June.” He stood, his legs now able to fully support him as he walked to the chair at the foot of the sofa and sat down.

“Good job, Doc,” Jeff said as he leaned back on the sofa with the handgun resting on his stomach. “Now where was I?” He stopped, his eyes narrowed as if watching prey. “Were you listening at all, Doc? Huh?”

“Yes, I was, Jeff, but let’s go back to your wife. Tell me about her. And you can put the gun down. You have my full attention. It makes me nervous. You don’t need it.”

Jeff looked at the gun before he started. “My Dottie? She was the best,” he began, and set the revolver on the chrome-and-glass table between them. It clattered loudly as it hit the glass. “She kept me sane and out of trouble. I never wanted to do anything crazy-like because of her.” He paused, nearly in tears. “All anybody wants to do is to give me drugs. They say it’s supposed to help, but it just gives me terrible nightmares, over and over . . . reliving the day she died.” He stopped talking for a moment.

“And now—she’s gone. Gone from my life forever. I wake up every morning thinking of her. Damn!” he shouted. Ryan nodded in agreement, which only seemed to anger his already-agitated patient. “What the hell do you know? About loss? You got it all. Fancy clothes, nice office, I bet you got a new car—yeah, Doc, you got it all.” He picked up the gun from the table and began waving it around.

Ryan’s hands began to shake as his gaze met the raging eyes of the broken man sitting before him. “No, I don’t. It may just look that way, Jeff, but without my Gracie, life is not worth living. I miss her terribly, but you tell yourself every day that you have to go on living.”

“You lost your wife?” Jeff said, looking visibly shaken. “I didn’t know . . . really. Nobody ever told me that she died.”

“Yeah, close to two years ago. She was riding her bike along the beach road, on A1A, and somebody hit her and kept going.” His voice drifted off. “She held on for a few hours at the hospital, but she had too many internal injuries to survive.”

“Did they catch the guy? The guy who did it?” Jeff asked, leaning toward the doctor, the gun drooping in his hands, toward the floor.

“Yeah, they thought so, but they couldn’t make it stick. His wife and best friend came through with an alibi for him. I would have done anything to save her.” He stopped for a moment, his voice cracking. “And I miss her so much that sometimes I wish it had been me that had died because without her I just don’t want to go on living if . . .”

The sound of car doors slamming drew his attention to the window. Jeff was on his feet in an instant and peeked through the small wooden blinds covering the windows. Police.

“You almost had me there, Doc,” he said in the voice of one betrayed, “but you had to send for the police, now didn’t you? Get on your knees! Kneel down! Now! Put your hands behind your head. Move!” he commanded, waving the gun in Ryan’s direction.

The scared doctor knelt down as he was told, facing his desk, and soon felt the hardened steel of the pistol barrel against the back of his head. He heard the now-familiar sound of the hammer’s being cocked, the gun ready to fire. He knew he was going to die.

“So you want to see your wife, is that it? You want to join her? Right? I can arrange that for you, Doc, if that’s what you really want. Is it? Is it, Doc? Huh?”

He did not know what to say. He had always thought he wanted to join his Gracie, and now all he had to do was say yes, or nod his head, and he would be with her. As he always said to himself, she was only a breath away.
But what about Mary Kate? Robert? Bobby? Eian? And . . .

“No. No, I don’t want to die a needless death like she did.”

Jeff pressed the gun barrel harder against the back of his head. “Why not, Doc? What you got to live for? Tell me, Doc; tell the world. What do you have to live for?”

Ryan stopped to think before saying, “I want to see my daughter get married. I want to hold my grandkids in my arms, and I want to spoil them and see them walk down the aisle and get married too. I want to travel, to see the Acropolis in Athens, the pyramids in Egypt, the Colosseum in Rome, and the mountains of Scotland. I would love to see the green fields of . . .” He heard a noise behind him but kept going as if he was praying for his life, placing his hands together in front of him.

He slumped over but kept talking, almost praying, hoping that something he would say could save his life. He thought back to growing up with his brothers, his mom and dad, family picnics . . . the best. Good times. It all flashed through his mind.

“I want to see both of my brothers happy and help them leave their pain behind. I want them to both find somebody to love. And hell, maybe I want to love again, I want to find somebody to hold in my arms and . . .” The office door came crashing in, splintering, and soon his office was filled with uniformed police officers. They stood over him, watching as he still knelt on the old multicolored Moroccan prayer rug Grace had given him years ago. Finally one reached out a hand to help him stand up.

“Did you get him?” he asked in a shaky voice before he noticed his office’s rear door was ajar.

“He must have left through the rear exit there. But we’re still searching the building for him. Don’t worry, we’ll find him, he can’t be too far away,” said one of the younger officers as he leaned over and picked up a hand-scribbled message from the chair. “He left a note, Dr. Macgregor: ‘See you soon doc.’”

Ryan’s legs began to shake again.

Chapter Twelve

The two jovial voices came out loud over the airwaves. “Well, that’s it for us, South Florida. Thanks for joining us on
The Sports Show
. I’m Terry Walker . . .”

“. . . And I’m Eian Macgregor, signing off. We’ll be back here tomorrow to talk sports on
The Sports Show
on WFLX. See you then.” The red-and-white “ON THE AIR” light went dark, and they both took off their headphones and grinned. They had been working together for the past three years and now were both glad their workday was over.

“Good show, buddy boy,” said Walker, a former pro-football quarterback.

“Yeah,” Eian chimed in quietly.

“Hey, Mac, everything all right with you?”

“Just one of those days, you know?”

“Yeah, man, got plenty of those myself. What’s goin’ on?”

“Well, to start with, I got evicted from my own house—by my stepdaughter.”

“Laura?”

“The one and only. So I had to move in with my brother Ryan at his beach house.”

“You and him living together? He’s the meticulous one, right?”

“Yep. Then my brother Bob’s house burned down, so he’s living there as well.”

“Oh my God, all three of the Macgregor brothers living under one roof?”

“Yeah, and . . .” He grew silent. “Tomorrow marks the anniversary of Alice’s death. So let’s just say it hasn’t been a good couple of days.”

He missed her more than ever, lonely for her smile, her touch, her laugh. She had always made him laugh with her practical jokes, then she had amazed him by learning to speak both German and Greek at home, but in the end . . . she had made him cry when she couldn’t remember what lipstick was used for or even what it was called. She was always his rock, his confidante, even when she no longer knew who he was. It was not easy, but he always remembered the promise he had made to her so many years before . . . “in sickness and in health, till death do us part.” He had always been big on commitments. Goddamn, he missed her.

His radio-booth-mate coughed and brought him back to reality.

“And on top of that, I have to be fitted for a damn tux again for my niece’s wedding.”

“So?”

“Man, I look terrible in a tux. I’m so tall I look like a damn oversize penguin. And she wants us all to take dance lessons . . . and get a date for the wedding. Can you believe that? I think I’m going to call her and tell her exactly what I think of the whole idea.”

“Wait, you’re going to call Mary Kate Macgregor and give her a piece of your mind?”

“Yeah.”

Terry leaned back in his chair, put his hands behind his head, and grinned. “Man, this I gotta see.”

“Well,” Eian stammered, “I don’t have time right now, but she’s on my list to talk to, got it?”

“Got it,” Terry said, laughing. “Hey, you wanna get lunch?”

“Sure. That’d be good. Oh no, can’t do it. I got an autograph session set up by the station later on this afternoon with some young kids. So I can’t go missing for an afternoon. Maybe tomorrow?”

“Yeah, man, have your gal call my gal and we’ll compare calendars.” They both laughed as they went to their desks on opposite sides of the tiny cubicle they shared. He missed having a regular office.
Office? Damn,
he thought.
Rose.

“Oh, gotta go. I got an appointment today for the reopening of my office. I finally get my office space back. And my sofa.”

“Let me know what you think of your decorator. I may want to do something with my Miami office.”

“Rose? Oh, she’s good. She listens, takes lots of notes, and comes in under budget. I just can’t wait to see it and finally get some working space again,” Eian said, looking around the cramped, shared cubicle, which was no larger than a clothes closet.

“Is she good-looking?”

“Rose? Gee, man, I don’t know. But, yeah, I guess she’s rather attractive . . . I just never thought of her in that way.”

“What do you mean?”

“She was married to my best friend, Tony Gilardo, for some twenty years. The four of us did everything together until he died and we drifted apart. Then Alice was diagnosed with . . .” He stopped for a minute before saying, “She’s a good friend, and the wife of my best friend.”

“You mean the widow of your best friend. Either way, let me know what you think of how your office turned out. Gotta go. I’m starving. See ya tomorrow.”

Eian pulled his phone from his pocket and dialed her number.

Two rings. “Hello? Eian?” he heard her say in her pleasant way.

“Yeah. Hi, Rose. I just finished my radio show. I can be there in twenty minutes, if it’s all done.”

“Sure, but make it forty-five minutes. We’re just about done here. I want it to be perfect for you,” she said.

“Okay, see you then.”

“See ya.”

He saw a head poke into his cubicle opening.

“Hey, come on in.”

The young twentysomething in red sneakers, with a thick head of unruly black hair and a scraggly beard, walked inside. “Have you fired up your computer yet today, Mr. Macgregor?” he asked.

“No. Should I?”

“Yeah, you should, I fixed it. Remember you said you were having a problem with your computer slowing up or freezing?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, while you were doing your show this morning, I came in and fixed it.”

“Yeah?” Eian spun around in his chair and turned it on. The screen came up with his computer games there waiting for him, at his beck and call. He clicked the keyboard and—voilà! It worked. “Hey, man, this is great. Good job.” He kept typing.

“Anytime, Mr. Macgregor,” the young man said with a grin and turned to leave.

“Hey, Joey? Got a question for you.”

“Fire away.”

“You know, I’m kinda new to all this computer and search engine stuff.”

“Yeah, most ancient guys your age are the same way. Why?”

He let the reference to his age and computer savvy slide.

“Well, what if I wanted to find somebody’s phone number? Say, an old acquaintance, you know, out of state, from times long ago?”

Joey smiled his knowing smile and said, “Slide out from your chair and let me sit at your keyboard and see what I can do. What’s her name?”

“Paula Pragna. At least that was her name when I knew her.” Just the mention of her name gave him goose bumps. They had been high school and college sweethearts . . . and a little bit more. But over the years they had lost contact. The last he had heard, she was living in Europe somewhere, with some prince or something.

“Birth date?”

“Fourth of July. That’s a date that’s kind of hard to forget.”

“Paula Pragna, with a matching birth date, lives in Santa Monica, California. You want her phone number?”

Eian was stunned and could only try to act nonchalant as he nodded in agreement.

“Well, you want her number?”

He swallowed and whispered, “Yeah, sure. I guess.”

The young man printed out the information and handed it to him. “Anything else?

“No, I’m good. Thanks, for everything.”

The aging baseball star’s eyes were transfixed on her name and phone number. It was just that easy, amazing. Before he sat down at his desk, he stood and looked around the office, then dialed her number. It rang once, twice, and he was about to hang up, but it was too late . . . someone answered the phone.

“Hello? Paula?”

“Eian. Is that you?”

“Yes.”

“It’s been a long time,” her sweet voice said, as if it were yesterday they had last talked. She had been waiting years for him to call.

Chapter Thirteen

“Paula, it’s so good to hear your voice again. How long has it been?”

“Time just flies, and faster and faster every year. Let’s just say it’s been years since we talked last.” She laughed. “How the hell are you? I watched your World Series performance. A no-hitter! That must have really helped your career. I was so impressed and happy for you. I wanted to call you to congratulate you, but . . . I didn’t want to stir up any hornet’s nest at home.” She talked in her usual rapid-fire manner.

“I understand.”

“What else have you been up to? I saw you retired from baseball but kind of lost touch.”

“I have my own sports marketing company and do a sports radio show here in Florida. Sign lots of autographs, manage a couple players as an agent, attend sports openings, and throw out the first pitch around the country. It’s a good gig, boring sometimes, but pays well.”

“I’m impressed. I read in the newspapers about your divorce a long time back. Sounded messy. Did you ever remarry?”

“Yes. A few years after my divorce I met a really sweet gal and we were married.” He stopped for a moment before continuing. “Her name was Alice. She died recently from complications from Alzheimer’s.”

“Eian, I am so sorry to hear that. My condolences.”

“Thank you. You know, I almost called you years ago, after my first marriage ended, but . . .” He paused, not really knowing what to say. “What about you? Married?”

“A few times,” she laughed. “But you know how that goes.” The phone went silent. “I would love to see you again, Eian. Unfortunately, I never get to the East Coast. Do you ever travel to California?”

“Occasionally. Hey . . . as a matter of fact, I’m supposed to go to Los Angeles for a few days next week. The professional baseball team there is opening a new training facility and asked me to come there for a ceremonial baseball pitch for one of my old coaches. They’ll pay for everything—air, hotel, rental car, food—the works.”

“No need for a hotel room or any of that stuff. You can stay with me, at the beach house. It would be like old times. Remember?”

He nearly blushed, thinking back to those days.
Why not?
“Sure, why not? It’s set for Tuesday.”

“Let me give you my cell-phone number. I’m rarely at home. You’re lucky you caught me.”

They exchanged phone numbers, and as he was about to say good-bye, she said, “I’m so glad you called me. I was just thinking about you the other day. I’ve missed you, I’ve missed us. Call me soon. Bye.”

He hung up the phone and felt elated. His life was beginning to turn around. He glanced at his watch and grabbed his jacket. He didn’t want to be late for his meeting with Rose.
Rose?
A feeling deep in his stomach began to gnaw at him, and he didn’t understand what it was. Time to go, but for some reason he could not shake the feeling inside him.